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SA-Dakar 2012: Astana Rally Team from Kazakhstan prepares with two trucks.

Two teams from Kazakhstan are to take part in the 2012 Southamerica Dakar rally. Last year's debut made by Team Astana on a rented Russian Kamaz truck was incredibly successful as they finished eighth in one of the world's largest race. In this year the team will start with two trucks.

Arthur Ardavichus will once again drive a Kamaz while last year's co-driver Denis Berezovskiy will pilot a prototype in the off-road vehicles class. Instead of Berezovskiy, an experienced Russian navigator Andrei Kuzmich will lead the Astana crew through the roads of the South American continent. Nurlan Turlybayev is now the team’s new mechanic as he replaced Zhanat Zhalimbetov who is now the team’s technical director.

Marat Abykayev, Teamdirector of Astana told: "Kamaz-Master is to be responsible for the team’s maintenance. We hired a Russian navigator. Of course, we need to train our own navigators so we are now working on it. However, working in the team on the race is a responsible task so we took on the Russian navigator for now."